The present invention relates to an arrangement of car walls for an elevator car.
Elevator cars, particularly in passenger elevators, have several essentially vertical car walls which, arranged adjacent to each other, bound the internal space. Since, during building construction, the elevator hoistway is sometimes first completed to such an extent that the complete elevator car in its entirety can no longer be inserted into the elevator hoistway, the elevator car must be subsequently assembled from individual components inside the hoistway. For this purpose, the individual car walls should be easy to assemble with each other, as far as possible from the inside. For maintenance, for the replacement of damaged car walls, or for the replacement of the entire elevator car, such as in the case of a modernization, the individual car walls should also be easy to disassemble again.
For this purpose, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,842,545 and 6,082,501 respectively propose car walls of metal sheeting in which on a vertical end-face of a car wall a hook-shaped flange that is angled toward the inside engages with a hook-shaped flange that is angled toward the outside on an abutting end-face of an adjacent car wall. The outwardly angled flange projects beyond the outside of the car wall and disadvantageously enlarges the total external dimension the elevator car. Furthermore, the projecting flanges are susceptible to the effects of forces from outside that can damage the flange connection and thereby either loosen the connection of the car walls or, conversely, cause the flanges to be bent together in such manner that they can no longer be released.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,357,993 and DE 24 53 196 A1 show as alternative an elevator car in which flanges that project from a first car wall beyond its end-face engage from above in vertical recesses in the adjacent car wall or in recesses in flanges that project from the adjacent car wall beyond its end-face. Here, too, flanges project disadvantageously that enlarge the overall dimension of the elevator car and are susceptible to damage.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,632,146 discloses an elevator car with a car wall arrangement, having a first car wall on whose outside a first flange is arranged that projects beyond a first end-face of the car wall and is angled by 270° from the outside. Arranged on the outside of an adjacent car wall is a second flange that projects parallel to the outside beyond the second car wall and engages vertically from below in a recess of the first flange. In this arrangement, too, both flanges project beyond the outside of the car walls in such manner that they disadvantageously enlarge the external dimension of the elevator car and are susceptible to damage from outside.